Sewing Assistants

After much training and constant reminding, we finally have a working arrangement. While my quilt studio is not small, it is oddly laid out and has a "bump out" (I believe that's the technical term) in one corner. I adopted that as my location for the three tables that make up the heart of my work. The serging station, mini pressing/cutting station, the sewing station and a partial fourth side that is a floor to ceiling bookshelf to hold tools and reference material. I can access them each from my chair in the center. It's a great setup.Very efficient. Except for the fact that the dogs seemed to think it was where I needed them to be whenever I was in the room. Of course this is with tails, ears and paws laying dangerously in the path of my chair's wheels as I scoot, with my attention riveted on my project, from one task to another. I know this because there was a good bit of yelping and jumping about involved.

But I was determined to train them to stay out of "The Sacred Sewing Square" as I dubbed it. So training commenced and after weeks of ordering, pointing, sharply speaking and 1,000+ times of asking them to leave...     I finally put a dog bed under the cutting table so that at least Simple Dog would stay put and out of harms way. Helper Dog feels guilty about everything (and I mean everything, including crop failures in the Midwest) and so was easier to train. She is also larger and didn't find the confined space as comfortable. So I had assistants and the training was obviously effective. On me. Everything seemed to smooth out until my sister's dog came to stay. Special Dog, we'll call her, seems even more confused by life than is Simple Dog.

Training commenced again. Especially since running over a very small dog with only three good legs seems more than cruel. However, this time the training was effective in much less time. In only 24 hours I had taught her learned that another dog bed needed to be squeezed into the SSS.

And so here are my sewing assistants providing much needed help as I work.

It really is a dog's life.